


Seas Would Rise

by sevenofspade



Category: Viva La Vida - Coldplay
Genre: Gen, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 07:22:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2842862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenofspade/pseuds/sevenofspade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dead, mortal and gone, the gods went and left behind the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Seas Would Rise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Reyka_Sivao](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reyka_Sivao/gifts).



> I hope you enjoy this! I enjoyed writing it.

> [Begin tape.] 
> 
> INTERROGATOR: "The interviewee is a human female. Name unknown, age unknown."
> 
> INTERVIEWEE: _"Once, the gods roamed the world. I should know, I was one of them._  
> 

* * *

The doors of the palace flew open and Wind drifted in with a face like spun glass.

"Wind!" Sea exclaimed, as she smiled like a shark might smile. There were too many teeth in her human mouth. "What a nice surprise."

"Sea," Wind said, looking at her with those see-through eyes, then at the palace and the city beyond. "This is new."

"Do you like it?" Sea flowed down from her throne.

"You did not make it," Wind said.

Sea laughed, a sound like crashing waves. "Of course not. The people made it for me."

"They made it for you?" Wind asked, a hand on one of the windows.

"Yes. I keep the water away and they live here in peace," she said, draping an arm around Wind's shoulders.

Wind shrugged her off. "They made it for you?"

"As they made your clothes," Sea said, gesturing to the floating coat and the miles and miles of scarves.

"I made my clothes," Wind said, "from the idea they had of me."

"And I made the people, who made this city from the idea they had of it," Sea said. "It is much the same thing, save that you bend to the idea they have of you and I am the sea and always shall be."

* * *

> INTERROGATOR: "Yes, we know about the two of you."
> 
> INTERVIEWEE: _"Three. There were three of us, in the beginning."_  
> 

* * *

"Sea," Wind said, voice, as always and ironically enough, breathless. Wind had no lungs. Wind had no body, in fact; Wind was just a mirage made of air.

"Wind," Sea replied. Today, she looked not human at all, all sharp fins and mirror-smooth scales over her woman-shape.

"Your city is growing," Wind said.

"Yes," Sea said. "Cities are much like mortals that way. They grow and have a mind of their own."

"Are you not afraid it will grow too big for you?" Wind asked.

Sea laughed like a thunderstorm. "I am the sea. Nothing is too big for me."

"Some things are infinite," Wind said.

Sea spun and slapped Wind into the opposite wall. Had Wind been mortal and connected, Wind would have died, but Wind was not mortal and did not even touch the wall.

"Yes," Sea said, "and I am one of them."

"Earth thought the same thing once," Wind said, smoothing coat lapels before mending rips in scarves.

"And we proved him wrong when we killed him, you and I," Sea said. She ground her heel into the tiles, shattering them and did not look at the floor Wind's feet didn't touch. 

"Yes," Wind said and was gone.

* * *

> INTERVIEWEE: _"Sea. Wind. Earth. What more do you need to make a world? Nothing."_  
> 

* * *

Sea paced the streets of the City in the Bay. It had had another name, once, but few save her even remembered it, let alone called the city by it.

As Sea walked, she came across, as is often the case in such stories, three siblings. They asked for her wisdom.

Sea laughed. The sea was ancient, but it was not wise. It was the sea and that was enough. Still, she entreated the siblings to share their tale with her. They did.

The brother, it seemed, believed that since he owned the land on which the house was built, the house and everything in it belonged to him. The sister objected, as she owned the house. The last sibling owned everything in the house.

It was a tale that was familiar to Sea, perhaps too familiar, and she did not listen to the details when she struck the brother down. His siblings turned on her, uncomprehending.

She waved away their grief and smiled as a ship wrecker might have smiled when she saw the power she held on the hearts of mortals.

As she walked away the earth beneath her feet moved not at all.

* * *

> INTERVIEWEE: _"Do you know what's left when a god dies? No, of course not. No one ever met a dead god, because nothing's left when a god dies. No soul, no miracles, no names in holy books. Nothing. Not even this."_
> 
> [The sound of handcuffs being shaken presumably accompany the INTERVIEWEE gesturing at herself.]

* * *

Sea's eyes were open now. She had thought the city had peace, because it did not have war. But if cities are much like mortals in that they grow, then mortals are much like cities in that they make war on one another.

That Sea could not allow.

They had built her the city against the promise of peace and the sea always keeps its promises. First among those is that everything comes back to the sea, in the end.

So Sea walked the streets and when she met a mortal, she laid a finger on their brow, as a blessing, she told them. Sometimes, she laughed. Often, she was sombre. It was dirty work. 

The City had a King and a Princess and he was first. The princess, meanwhile, fled or danced away with her lover and Sea cared not.

She should have.

The princess had seen what Sea's blessing had done to her father and was doing to the people of the city. The city stopped growing; it no longer had a mind of its own. In that it was much like the mortals that lived in it.

When the King died, Sea was acclaimed as his successor and when came time for her to wear the crown, she did not bend the knee to receive it.

And meanwhile the princess became a revolutionary and searched far and wide, until she found a cliff so stiff she thought the world had ended and there was nothing left but howling winds.

She had found what she had been looking for.

* * *

> INTERROGATOR: "You are not a god anymore."
> 
> INTERVIEWEE: _"No?"_  
> 

* * *

Wind blew open the palace doors, windows shattering to the sound of drums. The Revolutionary walked behind.

"Sister," Wind said. "What have you become?"

"There is peace in the city," Sea said, as though that was answer enough.

"Is it enough?" Wind asked.

When Sea spoke again, her voice was full of saltwater. "I am the sea. Nothing is ever enough."

"Ride," Wind told the Revolutionary and handed her the reins to a horse made of the winds that blew inland.

The Revolutionary rode and did not look back.

If she had, she might have seen something like this:

Sea stepped down from her throne and Wind and she fought. Their fight tore the city asunder, but the horse did not disappear and so Wind must have won.

Or perhaps this is what she missed:

"I am sorry," said Wind.

And Sea laughed and said, "I know, sibling."

She took the form of a mortal woman and knelt at Wind's feet. Wind struck her down and the sea, free at last, swept the streets it had once owned.

Another thing might have happened or another or another or another, but we will never know. The city sleeps alone beneath the waves and where we once had two gods, we now have none.

They say you can still hear Wind, in the bay the city used to be in. 

Dead, mortal and gone, the gods went and left behind the world.

* * *

> [There is nothing more on the tape save the sound of waves. It sounds like laughter.]


End file.
